Trial by Media (or Branding Russell III)

To start off, a comment from yesterday on my Brand piece:

"Oh dear you lost my interest as soon as you mentioned Brexit, which by default whatever else you illuded to was to be rhetoric of a kind I do not submit to! You have already in your piece arrived at a conclusion, and ignored any evidence to the contrary, as it does not ally to your political convictions! A sad state to publicly convict someone on social media,prior to any trial as if you are Judge, Jury etc. I look forward to your apology when all accusations are proven inaccurate, as will I if proven wrong!!"

This is a classic piece of ignoring the evidence. Had the writer, who was anonymous, bothered to read the piece, he (or she) would have discovered that I reached no such conclusion on Brand's guilt. He (or she) arrived at a conclusion totally ignorant, by their own admission, of what I wrote. Also they have tried Band and found him innocent, without access to the detailed evidence, which none of us have, beyond what has been reported thus far.

I guess he (or she) can be excused from reading the full piece by the way I referred, quite justifiably, to Brexiteers (I was quite scathing), but not from inferring from a position of ignorance.

The comment does, however, bear out my suggested link between Brexiteer and Brand acolyte. I don't imagine for one minute that the Venn diagram is a perfect circle, but I would suggest that the vast majority of Brand supporters sit in the Brexit circle - not the other way round.

However, to the subject, trial by media. What is meant by that? I do not believe that factual reporting is trial by media. If you did believe that, and that a fair trial would be jeopardised, yesterday's news item about the Bulgarian spy ring could be considered trial by media, indeed any factual reporting that is likely to result in a trial would be 'trial by media'. It's strange that the phrase is used only when someone who has a large following is under scrutiny - for others, they couldn't care less.

Nothing the Times, the Sunday Times and Channel 4 have produced make a conclusion - they merely present the results of an investigation, and investigations by the press and TV have exposed many areas of wrongdoing in the past, from Watergate to Savile. Do they go wrong? Certainly, but very infrequently.

What is trial by media is the manner in which Harry and Meghan have been treated by certain tabloids - supposition, twisting of words (and, in some cases outright lies) portrayed as fact and turned into character assassination. This is the stock in trade of tabloid journalism.

You don't have to be a genius to gather that the loudest voices calling the reporting on Brand 'trial by media' are Brand's supporters on his various channels, which is only natural. However, Brand himself engages in trial by media on his channels - making many allegations lacking any evidence (aka conspiracy theories).

If there's a trial by anything, it's trial by social media, although I have not seen many posts that outright condemn him as guilty. Plenty maintain his innocence. The jury's not even in position, let alone out.

Brand was out of control in a number of areas, but he was TV gold, so any concerns were conveniently ignored on hiring him in the first place, and extending his contract in the second. People, meaning those who loved his shows, demonstrate that this is a societal problem. He summed it up himself when he said (and I paraphrase when he said on the Despatches programme; "It's OK to be a bit of a nutter, as long as you're making someone some money."